Hoosiers losers in a big way

-Minnesota embarasses IU for its first Big Ten win of the year.

-Minnesota embarasses IU for its first Big Ten win of the year.

January 30, 2006|DOUG WILSON Bloomington Herald-Times

MINNEAPOLIS -- Indiana crashed to its lowest point of this basketball season with a 61-42 blowout loss at Minnesota Sunday. The Gophers entered the game at 0-6 in league play and 9-8 overall, but demolished the 13th-ranked Hoosiers. Hitting 13 of its first 17 shots, Minnesota raced to a 19-point first-half lead and led by at least 16 the entire second half. IU senior Marshall Strickland had said he wanted to avenge last year's Big Ten tourney disappointment when the Gophers defeated IU 71-55 in Chicago. Instead, IU suffered another Minnesota meltdown, generating the second-lowest point total of Mike Davis's six years as head coach at IU. The lowest was in an 80-41 loss to Kentucky in December 2003. At halftime, IU had just 16 points, not even half of Minnesota's 34. The loss dropped the Hoosiers to 12-5 overall and 4-3 in Big Ten play. The Hoosiers are 0-3 on the road in conference games, losing all three by at least 13 points and allowing each opponent to shoot at least 51 percent. "I'm not going to insult you guys' intelligence at all by saying that we were ready to play," Davis told the media after the game. "We weren't ready to play. "This is our third road game and all three games have been the same. We look like a team that's afraid to play on the road." Davis said his team has just hoped to make shots offensively on the road when what it needs to do is make plays defensively. IU sophomore A.J. Ratliff said he thought the Hoosiers underestimated Minnesota. "A lot of guys might have thought they're 0-6 and even though it was on the road, we were easily going to get a win," Ratliff said. "And they got us." Minnesota coach Dan Monson surprised IU by starting two players on his front line who don't normally start. Zach Puchtel, a 6-foot-6, 250-pound senior walk-on who had played in just nine games this season for a total of 38 minutes, started and was given the assignment of guarding IU's leading scorer Marco Killingsworth. And Monson gave 6-5 freshman walk-on Jamal Abu-Shamala just his third start of the season. "Coach Monson did the best thing any coach could do," Davis said. "He played some guys who wanted to come out and play with effort and intensity. "You have to take your hat off to coach Monson for having the courage to play some guys who normally wouldn't start and wouldn't play in this environment. They rewarded him by coming out and playing with the effort they needed to win." Davis said Puchtel wasn't even included in IU's scouting report on Minnesota, but fought for position inside against Killingsworth better than any opponent all season. When that happened, IU wasn't patient enough to reverse the basketball and set some screens offensively, and just put up outside shots instead, Davis said. Killingsworth had his second straight off-game, scoring 15 points, with six of them coming in the final three minutes when IU trailed by close to 20. He played just 10 minutes in the first half because of foul trouble. "It hurt us when Marco picked up his second foul because that was a stretch when we had no idea what we were doing," Ratliff said. "When Marco goes out, everybody is kind of like, 'Who is going to be the guy to take over?' Robert (Vaden) wasn't hitting his shots early, so it put us in a tough position." Ratliff said he has no clue why IU plays so badly on the road, except that when you get off to a bad start away from home, it's harder to recover because of the crowd. "It was embarrassing," Ratliff said of a performance in which the Hoosiers trailed by as many as 23 points. "We've got a lot more games to play," Killingsworth said. "We've got to put this behind us and try to win. That's it." MINNESOTA 61, INDIANA 42INDIANA(12-5): Killingsworth 6-14 3-4 15, Vaden 4-9 0-0 11, Strickland 0-4 0-0 0, Monroe 2-4 0-0 4, Ratliff 1-7 0-0 3, Wilmont 3-8 0-0 6, Allen 0-1 0-0 0, Calloway 0-1 0-0 0, Kline 0-1 0-0 0, Suhr 1-4 0-0 3 . Totals 17-53 3-4 42. MINNESOTA(10-8): Stamper 5-6 2-5 12, Puchtel 2-5 2-4 6, Abu-Shamala 3-6 0-0 7, Grier 7-14 3-6 17, Boone 2-7 0-0 4, Tollackson 4-4 0-0 8, Hargrow 2-6 0-0 4, Coleman 0-2 0-0 0, Tucker 1-1 0-0 3, Saunders 0-0 0 -0 0. Totals 26-51 7-15 61. Halftime -- Minnesota 34-16. 3-Point Goals -- Indiana 5-23 (Vaden 3-6, Suhr 1-4, Ratliff 1-5, Calloway 0-1, Allen 0-1, Monroe 0-2, Wilmont 0-2, Strickland 0-2), Minnesota 2-7 (Tucker 1-1, Abu-Shama la 1-2, Hargrow 0-1, Boone 0-3). Fouled Out -- Vaden. Rebounds -- Indiana 31 (Killingsworth 8), Minnesota 35 (Grier 10). Assists -- Indiana 8 (Strickland 5), Minnesota 18 (Boone 9). Total Fouls -- Indiana 1 8, Minnesota 14. A -- 13,136.To reach Doug Wilson: dwilson@heraldt.com